


Too Stubborn To Die

by Brumeier



Series: Bite Sized Fic [29]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Hospitals, M/M, Prompt Fill, Serious Injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-21 13:18:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6053020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier/pseuds/Brumeier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>LJ Comment Fic for Believed Dead prompt: <i>any. any. "You're too stubborn to die now, do you hear me!"</i></p><p>In which Danny struggles when Steve is seriously injured.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Too Stubborn To Die

Danny wasn’t conscious of anything happening around him. It was all just jumbled background noise, though on some level he knew Chin and Kono were clearing the scene. He only had eyes for Steve, and the blood leaking over his hands where he had them pressed to Steve’s side, and the blood on Steve’s lips as he struggled to breathe.

“Stay with me, Steve!” he said, aware that the words were too loud, too desperate. He should be exuding confidence and calm, but his heart was pounding in his chest and his hands were shaking as he tried to keep Steve alive.

Danny startled when Kono put her hand on his shoulder. “I hear the ambulance, Danny. They’re close.”

Not close enough. Steve’s struggles were getting weaker, and there were tears sliding down his face, and he looked terrified. Steve should never look that way. Danny leaned in close, pressed a fierce, desperate kiss to Steve’s bloody lips.

“You’re too stubborn to die, do you hear me? I won’t allow it, Steven.”

Steve looked like he wanted to say something, and his hand was scrabbling at Danny’s as he pressed…hard, harder, there was too much blood. But just as the ambulance pulled up Steve gasped one last breath and went limp.

“No! No, Steve. Steve!”

It took both Chin and Kono to pull Danny out of the way so that the EMTs could do their job. He sat in the dirt, staring blindly at Steve’s blood on his hands. He felt hollowed out. Empty.

“I’ve got a pulse.”

Danny’s head whipped up at those words.

“Let’s load him up.”

The EMTs bundled Steve into the ambulance, but there wasn’t room for Danny. Not with Steve’s connection to the world being so fragile.

“I’m coming, babe! I’ll be right behind you!” Danny shouted as the ambulance doors closed and the vehicle sped away, siren wailing.

“I’ll drive you,” Kono said, tossing her car keys to Chin. 

Danny only paused long enough to pull a towel out of the trunk, and then spent the drive to the hospital trying to get the blood off his hands while simultaneously offering up prayers to any god that wanted to listen.

“He’ll be okay,” Kono said, brushing the tears off her face while she drove. “The boss is tough. He’ll pull through this.”

Danny wanted to believe. Steve had always been preternaturally un-killable. He’d survived things no normal person should have been able to. But this time…this time was different. He’d stopped breathing. The life had drained out of him, Danny had felt it go, felt it slipping through his fingers. He tasted Steve’s blood in his mouth.

It felt like the end of everything.

*o*o*o*

Steve really was a stubborn bastard. He had to be revived twice in the ambulance, and in all likelihood in the operating room as well. He’d lost a significant amount of blood, which prompted all his friends to donate while they were waiting at the hospital. It gave them something to do, made them feel they were contributing in some way.

Danny spent twenty minutes in the bathroom, scrubbing his hands raw, but he couldn’t get all the blood out from under his fingernails. One of the nurses had given him a scrub top to wear, because his shirt was ruined, but there was dried blood on his pants that he couldn’t top picking at.

The others talked in hushed tones around him – Chin and Kono, Lou and Jerry, Kamekona and Ellie. But Danny waited. Waited for the doctor to come and apologetically deliver the news that they hadn’t been able to save him. He wasn’t sure he could take another big loss in his life, not after Matt. And especially not Steve. Please, God, not Steve.

When the doctor did come, he was guardedly optimistic.

Danny couldn’t afford to get his hopes up.

*o*o*o*

There were no rules for Five-0 in the ICU, a fact that the staff had long ago become accustomed to. And there was especially no moving Danny. He was there around the clock, holding Steve’s hand and keeping watch.

And every hour that Steve’s heart continued to beat, every hour that he breathed on his own without needing a machine, Danny let him himself hope a little more.

When Steve finally blinked open his eyes, Danny was the first person he saw. Danny berated him for unnecessary heroics, and took him to task for making everyone worry about him. And when the nurses came to look him over, Danny locked himself in the nearest bathroom and wept until the shaking stopped.


End file.
